Business Opinions: Negotiation

In business you don’t get what you deserve, you get what you negotiate”

(Chester L. Karrass)

Negotiation had to start the first time people needed something from others. They all valued their possession higher than the others and they tried to get as much as possible. Of course in those times I think some of the negotiation ended with clubs being put on the table or swords being pulled out of their scabbards but it was a beginning.

            The frame on which mostly all negotiations are based on looks something like this:

1. Preparation – do your homework, know very well what you have to offer, establish a guideline (time, place, agenda) and remember that good preparation will help you eliminate frustration if things don’t go as you want.
2. Discussion – you and your partner will both present your case, strong points and advantages.  Listen carefully and ask questions, make sure at the end of this discussion you have everything clear. Try and listen more than you speak so that you can be prepared to give an answer having all the information at your disposal.
3. Clarify goals – After discussing and presenting both sides the goals of each party should be clearly stated. Present what you want and take into consideration what your counterparty wants.
4. Negotiate for a win-win result – based on information and goals at this point both parties should theoretically try and find a solution that solves the situation and everyone wins. Looking to reach a win-win situation is the best option especially when you are looking for a partner, any other outcome will not give you another chance of doing business with that person. If you value more a future partnership than a quick win you should consider compromise or alternatives at this stage.
5. Agreement – after both points have been agreed upon and everyone have everything clear the negotiation reaches the agreement stage. Put all the things you agreed upon on paper and sign at least a brief of the negotiation if not a contract. And also agree upon a deadline by which to take action. Regarding the documents American culture negotiators prefer a solid contract with solution for any future situation while Asian culture ones want only the important points and rely on trust
6. Implementation – of course if you reach an agreement and then just linger, negotiation is not a success, so at this stage a course of action is required. Follow the steps you agreed upon and if at any point the situation changes invite your partner to another discussion and be fair.

But no matter how well prepared your plan is you must also be careful about cultural differences. You must be able to adapt your strategies and messages to the business culture of your partner. Simple examples in cultural differences look at how the Americans and Japanese present themselves. The American will say “my name is John Smith; I am the Marketing Director for company X” while the Japanese will say “I am from company x, I am marketing director, my name is Kyoshi Yamamoto”. From the start you can see the difference, this means if you try and connect on a personal level with a partner from Japan in order to negotiate better it might backfire because they are first loyal to the company and if the deal is not 100% right for the company they will not let it go through. Also the American culture makes them put all on the table and try to resolve everything quick by making concession while in Japan they stick to the plan.

Just imagine going to an Arab country for a negotiation and include in your team a beautiful women, dressed in a business suit and speaking in the meeting. There is a good chance you will not make it past the lobby.

During the time I worked in sales in the construction industry I had a lot of negotiation with companies from Turkey, Germany and Italy and it was a good idea not to have them in the same day. Going from style to style was hard sometimes. For example, talking with the guys from Turkey you had to negotiate on the price so I started giving first a bigger price so that I could give them a discount during the negotiation. With German companies was the opposite, asked the price and then talk a lot about procedures and technical advantages of the materials. And with the Italian companies a 15 minutes talk could turn into a 2 hours general discussion about everything from football to the beautiful women of Bucharest.

There isn’t a modern Romanian negotiation culture, we only have real negotiations for about 20 years and the business culture was brought by the companies that invested in Romania. Because of this and the internal trainings their employees adopted the company culture so if you work for an American company you do business as they do and so on. But this makes Romania the country where you can meet each day a different negotiation style thus becoming an expert negotiator.